


Follies, Forged Attachments

by Mandaloria593



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Jedi Bashing (Star Wars), Jedi Code Bashing (Star Wars), Love, M/M, Meddling Force Ghosts (Star Wars), POV Third Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 13:13:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28600503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mandaloria593/pseuds/Mandaloria593
Summary: Obi-Wan watches things play out between Luke and Din. He knows all about getting mixed up with Mandalorians, especially falling in love with one. He wouldn’t recommend it.
Relationships: Din Djarin/Luke Skywalker
Comments: 13
Kudos: 313





	Follies, Forged Attachments

**Author's Note:**

> _I can see what’s happening. And they don’t have a clue. They’ll fall in love and here’s the bottom line...a trio grows from two. The sweet caress of twilight. There’s magic everywhere. And with all this romantic atmosphere, **disaster’s** in the air . . . _  
> -Timon, The Lion King, adapted
> 
> I actually adore Obi-Wan and don't necessarily think he'd be quite this rigid, hence the hopeful ending.

“Do you think this quest is wise?”

Luke didn’t open his eyes to greet Obi-Wan’s Force presence, but instead stayed in his meditative posture sitting on the deck of the old gunner, which the Mandalorian had christened _The Child’s Light._ “ _You_ think it _unwise.”_

Obi-Wan gracefully settled cross-legged in front of his former student, matching his pose. “I think it doesn’t matter what I think.”

Luke chuckled and opened his eyes, the blue orbs shining in welcome. “I would still like to hear it. Do you think there’s likely to be trouble? From what we’ve been able to determine, no imperial remnants remain on the surface or even in the system. Given the state of the planet, there’s nothing there worth guarding.”

“I am not concerned about Mandalore,” Obi-Wan explained. “I’m concerned about _this.”_ Obi-Wan waved his hand around the ship. 

Luke wrinkled his nose. “The ship?”

“No.”

“The Mandalorian?” 

“The delay in your training,” Obi-Wan clarified, although Luke hadn’t entirely missed the mark. “And that of Grogu’s.”

Luke hummed. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”

Luke grew more astute each time Obi-Wan visited him. It brought back bittersweet memories of working alongside his father. Keeping watch over Luke as he interacted with the Mandalorian was stirring up many old memories, some more painful than others. 

When Obi-Wan didn’t elaborate, Luke merely closed his eyes again. “Keep your secrets, then. But if you decide you want to share, I’m all ears, like little Grogu.”

The Jedi youngling was up in the cockpit with the Mandalorian. Obi-Wan drifted there through the walls of the ship and observed the child contentedly asleep in the Mandalorian’s arms, held lovingly to the man’s beskar-covered chest. The Mandalorian’s helmet was tipped down, reflecting the streaking lights of hyperspace as he also dozed. 

This one was trouble. 

Obi-wan knew it as surely as he knew his own essence in the living Force. 

At first, Obi-Wan had been supportive of Luke’s ongoing attempts to track down lost Jedi artifacts to supplement his training. But then Luke had stumbled across clues leading him to an artifact on Mandalore. He’d immediately and excitedly shared his finding with Grogu’s erstwhile caretaker, who’d been infected by Luke’s own enthusiasm seemingly despite himself. The Mandalorian’s reticence had ebbed away as Luke chipped at it, slowly and methodically, with as many meaningful shared silences as words. Before long, the two of them were pouring over ancient Jedi and Mandalorian scripts, their curiosity in the texts and each other’s backgrounds overcoming the distance between them. And now, they were flying across the galaxy together for “a history field trip,” as Luke had named it, as if it was also for Grogu’s benefit and not just an excuse to go on another adventure. 

Always looking to the horizon, Yoda had said. Master or not, that remained true. But Luke’s unJedi-like taste for adventure wasn’t the source of Obi-Wan’s disquiet. Although it was well and truly none of his business, being dead and all, and with the Jedi Order being just as dead, Obi-Wan still worried about Luke’s path in the lightness. And of all the aspects of the Jedi Code that Luke could have chosen to ignore, he’d gone right for the very stricture that had led Anakin to the Darkside: the rule against attachments. 

Luke had attachments to _everyone._ And rather than trying to temper those relationships into cooler, more detached kinships that were appropriate for a Jedi, he _nurtured_ them. He let them grow, ever more entangled and intense. 

Luke had not opted to recuse himself from the burgeoning New Republic society as Obi-Wan had suggested. Instead, he’d taken on the role of an advisor to Mon Mothma and stationed himself on Coruscant near Leia. His connection with his twin was stronger than ever. He had “boys nights” with Han, Chewbacca, Lando and Nien Nunb. He went flying with his pilot friends, like Wedge. Luke even had attachments to his _droid._

And worst of all, Luke kept forging _new_ attachments—like the one with the Mandalorian. 

Obi-Wan knew very well Luke’s capacity for compassion. Luke saw the good in everyone. He had an affinity for loyalty. He was attracted to steadfastness in his friends and allies. And even moreso, he believed in the power of a father’s love for his son, which he believed had saved him during his confrontation with the Emperor. And this Mandalorian had all of that wrapped up in a perfect steel package tied around the end of Grogu’s finger like a knight in shining armor. Luke’s attraction to him was as inevitable as the pull of a gravitational well in deep space. Obi-Wan could see it. But he didn’t know what to say to put a halt to it—if putting a halt to it was even possible. Still, as the self-appointed steward of Luke’s path in the light side of the Force, Obi-Wan had a responsibility to try. He would have to meditate on his approach.

Obi-Wan manifested to Luke several days later. He found the young Jedi Master huddled in a tent inside the ruins of a structure on Mandalore. Grogu and the Mandalorian were both with him. The glow from a lantern hanging from the top of the small tent cast soft shadows over the cozy trio. Luke and the Mandalorian were sitting shoulder to shoulder, arguing in hushed tones over a brittle, yellowed map with worn edges held between them. The Mandalorian was pointing at something on the map with a gloved finger, and Luke was jostling him as he pulled at the map, insisting that the Force was directing him elsewhere.

Luke glanced up when he sensed Obi-Wan, then resumed his quiet bickering with the Mandalorian. Obi-Wan waited patiently.

The Mandalorian, oblivious to Obi-Wan’s presence, was sighing and letting go of the map in favor of resting his palm on Luke’s flesh hand. He murmured something and leaned his helmeted head on Luke’s shoulder. Luke’s hand came up to the Mandalorian’s helmet and guided it towards him as he gently pressed his forehead to the tip of the helmet. 

Obi-Wan sighed to himself and folded ghostly hands under his robe. He shimmered across the tent’s wall to wait outside. Surveying the area, he felt a pinprick of recognition. He looked down at his feet and saw a piece of shattered glass. It was etched with a familiar shape—the same shape that emblazoned the center of the Mandalorian’s chest. Was this the great hall? Was this where he met her, found her again, and irretrievably lost her?

He didn’t think Luke would find anything left of Jedi here—unless he was looking for pieces of Obi-Wan’s broken heart. 

Obi-Wan was surprised when Luke managed to appear at his side without him having noticed.

“Pretty bleak,” Luke said, almost absently. “So, do you want to tell me about it?”

“If it would be a help to you, I will offer the tale.” 

Luke gestured to a rock-sized piece of rubble, and they both sat down. 

Obi-Wan started his story with a thread in the middle, as he often did. “If she had said the word, I would have left the Order.”

Luke looked visibly astonished. Obi-Wan was again reminded of Anakin’s reaction to the same recounting. 

“She was a pacifist Mandalorian.”

Luke snorted at that, clearly thinking of his own Mandalorian, whose weapons may as well have been cherished cultural heirlooms. “Those existed?”

“They might still,” Obi-Wan admonished. “It was a time of Civil War on Mandalore, as it often was. I was a young Padawan assigned to protect a young new duchess. In the wake of unrest from the old militarist sects, we evaded the grasp of bounty hunters for nearly a year. She and I became very close. It was a dangerous time for me.”

“You don’t mean dangerous because of the bounty hunters,” Luke guessed.

“I do not. I was tempted to leave the Order and stay to help her pave the way for the New Mandalorians.” Obi-Wan stroked his chin as he dipped further back into his long memory. “My adherence to the Jedi Code was tested. I had to make the choice. The choice that all Jedi must make and renew every day. The choice to live by the Code. To reject attachments that may cause us to stray from the light.” 

“Stray?” Luke echoed. “But from how you describe her, she wasn’t exactly a bad influence. She was a pacifist, a leader striving for peace and prosperity for her people. And you loved her. What’s dark about that?”

Obi-Wan considered his reply before he spoke. “Love itself does not lead to the darkside. Love leads to covetousness, to prioritizing one soul over another under the living force. The desire to protect loved ones from threats equally induces the desire to destroy that which threatens. Attachments leave one vulnerable to darker influences, which prey on the light, twisting it into grotesque vagaries of suffering, hatred, and ultimately? Evil.”

Luke didn’t say anything. 

“The day I had to watch Satine die by the hand of a former Sith, the very one who had killed my Master, was a day that lives in infamy in my mind. I gave all of it to the Force, and only through the Force did I emerge still in the light. Trust the Force, Luke,” Obi-Wan urged. “Trust the Code. Your professed need to rewrite it is folly.”

“Folly? Really? You want to talk about follies?” Luke rose to his feet, his voice rising with him. “How about the folly of the Jedi Counsel to not see the rise of Palpatine beneath their noses? How about your folly to leave my grandmother in slavery on a backwater desert, as if you were condoning it? How about the folly of telling my father to just embrace the potential death of his partner and unborn child?” Luke was shouting now. “And how about the folly of hiding just around the next dune but never telling me about my family or even preparing me to be ready?”

Before Obi-Wan responded, another voice called out in the darkness. “Luke? Are you all right?”

It was the Mandalorian of course. Strong vambrace-covered arms came to wrap around Luke, sure and comforting. The touch appeared to ground Luke. “I’m fine. I’m just talking to some ghosts about the value of love.”

“Is that all?” the Mandalorian asked, his tone measured but tinged with humor.

And Luke must have told the Mandalorian something about Force ghosts because the helmet actually swiveled around on its owner’s neck as if to catch an apparition hovering in the mist. 

Obi-Wan took his cue to leave. The _folly_ was attempting this conversation when Luke was so obviously unwilling to listen. 

As he retreated, he heard Luke call out to him. “Love saved my life. It saved all of us. Maybe it could have saved you too, if you’d let it.”

Utter hokum. If he’d stayed on Mandalore with Satine, he’d never have become a Jedi Knight. Never have taken Anakin as his Padawan learner. Never have lost his best friend to the dark influence of a Sith lord. Never have been self-exiled to a remote hovel to stand guard over the only hope of a ruined galaxy. Never have been struck down by the person he cared for most in the universe. 

> _I hate you!_
> 
> _You were my brother, Anakin! I loved you._

Love wasn’t going to protect Luke from the darkside. Obi-Wan was certain of this. But would love set Luke irredeemably on a dark path? Perhaps not. He couldn’t find the right words to refute Luke’s claims about the Code, about the Jedi, or about himself.

If he was going to remain involved in Luke’s life, as he’d promised Yoda and Luke himself, it seemed he was going to have to work around Luke’s stubborn and dangerous beliefs. There was no changing Luke’s mind. Obi-Wan was the dead one, so he was the one who had to bend to the caprices of the living. 

So...love. Love of family and friends. _Lovers._

He would have to meditate on it. He would have to meditate on the role of love in a Jedi’s life. 

Obi-Wan dissolved his corporeal form into the living Force. He had much to think on.

**Author's Note:**

> Curious about this take on the Jedi and why Luke was a clean break from it in ROTJ? Watch this [commentary](https://youtu.be/tUPD1w78D5I/).


End file.
